


trojan horse

by toromeo (ald0us)



Category: Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: Abandonment Issues, Dubious Consent Due To Identity Issues, Identity Issues, Implied/Referenced Drug Addiction, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Secret Identity, also portrayal of anxiety and depression that might be a little triggering?, hgasjdg that was already a canonical tag
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-05-10
Updated: 2019-05-10
Packaged: 2020-02-29 17:57:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,061
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18783265
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ald0us/pseuds/toromeo
Summary: Trojan Horse: a form of malware that disguises itself in any form of attractive packaging that fools the user into accepting and spreading the virus. The malware often opens up a backdoor that allows unauthorized access to the computer, allowing a controller access to a user's personal information.Jonathan is everything Sebastian needs him to be. But who—or what—he is remains a mystery.





	trojan horse

**Author's Note:**

> Set in an AU set sometime between late 2a and early 2b. Sebastian and Jonathan meet in Paris and Jonathan follows him back to his apartment in New York. In case it's not immediately clear, Jonathan has shapeshifted into his appearance in 3b. 
> 
> Enjoy!

“I am become a name;  
For always roaming with a hungry heart  
Much have I seen and known; cities of men  
And manners, climates, councils, governments,  
Myself not least, but honour'd of them all;  
I am a part of all that I have met;  
Yet all experience is an arch wherethro'  
Gleams that untravell'd world whose margin fades  
For ever and forever when I move.”  
— Lord Alfred Tenysson, _Ulysses_  
  
  
“I’ll, I’ll uh, make the tea,” says Jonathan, sitting up in bed so that the sheets pool around his slender waist. He's jittery again, picking at his fingers, unable to sit still. Like a live wire. He glances around the apartment as if expecting it to spontaneously come alive and attack him. There’s something extremely uneasy in his dark eyes, and Sebastian reaches up to smooth his hair, on habit, and he leans into the touch. “That Jasmine lavender blend again?”  
  
He’s always attentive—Sebastian loves that about him. After a damning string of exes who always promised but never quite managed to give as much as they got, it warms him more than he likes to admit when Jonathan remembers the little details: folding his shirts just the way he likes them when he helps with laundry. Picking up the wrappers Sebastian tends to leave trailed around the apartment when he’s working (a cardinal flaw, if Aunt Elodie is to be believed). Remembering the last four digits of his Institute-assigned social security number when Sebastian left him on hold with the New York electricity and gas department? Maybe not so much. “The Lavender would be lovely. Thank you, sweetheart.”  
  
Jonathan is out of bed in a flash before Sebastian can pull him back, deftly extracting the tea kettle from the dish rack without even a clatter of dishes. Sebastian admires the long curve of his back, pale even in the lamplight. He notices things, sometimes, things he feels he ought not to notice. Jonathan’s runes are uneven, some even scarred, as if they had been applied too young. The scars that don’t look like they came from demon wounds. The way he sometimes takes showers so long and so hot that steam billows in searing clouds from the bathroom, how he emerges bright red and shaking.  
  
Right now, however, he’s mostly noticing Jonathan’s arse. In his defense, it’s a very nice arse. Very muscular. Looks very nice when he’s making tea. Would look even better out of his jeans. When did he put those back on?  
  
“You don’t have to,” Sebastian says, reaching out a hand. Half pleading, but edged with promise and wrapped in a pout. “Come on, back to bed. We can watch that horrible Netflix show you like that gives me nightmares.”  
  
Jonathan manages one of his shy smiles for him, turning away from filling the kettle with tap water. Sebastian doesn’t have the heart to tell him never in a million years would he ordinarily drink anything that wasn’t bottled. A souvenir from his brief days at the Beijing Institute. “ _Hannibal?_ ”  
  
“Yes, you gruesome little thing. Don’t think I didn’t catch you smiling at the murders. If I’d known all it takes are a few corpses to get you so frisky, I’d have rented a place closer to a graveyard.”  
  
Jonathan gives an abrupt little laugh, choking it off quickly as he always does. He puts the kettle on the stove, turns the stove on, and looks up like Sebastian is a very bright light. “Maybe uh, they have to be fresh.”  
  
Sebastian fakes horror, pressing his fingertips to his chest. “ _Mon dieu_. Should I be worried I may wake up stitched to other human bodies to form an eyeball? Oh, or made into a body totem pole.” He hauls himself upright with effort (Jonathan may be reticent about many things but being a demanding, energetic lover is emphatically not one of them) and snags his laptop off his desk, flipping it open. “Or that deranged episode with the woman under the bed—by the Angel, I won’t unsee that as long as I live.” He shudders, resisting the urge to peek under the bed—just to check. He’d held onto Jonathan a lot tighter that night than he usually would.  
  
“We could watch _Say Yes To The Dress_ ,” Jonathan offers. He’s leaning against the kitchen island, a peculiar look in his eyes. He’s fetched the lavender tea and two mugs—his favorite, a rather garish one that reads “I <3 PARIS,” and Sebastian’s, a handmade one sent by Aline from one of her trips to Peru. Say _Yes to the Dress_ was, beside _Hannibal_ and _Dexter_ , his other favorite show. Jonathan had tried very hard to pretend he wasn’t crying at the first episode of _Say Yes to the Dress_ they watched, those pretty eyes rimmed-red and brimming with tears, and Sebastian had hit him with the tissue box and told him not to bottle up his feelings like a heterosexual man. In response, Jonathan had stared unblinkingly at him for an uncomfortably long time before bursting into tears and using up the rest of the tissue box.  
  
He had also gotten rather emotional to _Dexter_ , which was a lot less understandable and perhaps a smidge more worrying. “Whichever you like, darling. As long as you promise not to drown your poor tea in sugar. Really, can you even taste it in that state?”  
  
“Of course I can taste it. It tastes like sugar.” Jonathan turns off the stove and drops the tea strainer into the kettle. It hits the bottom with a soft _clink_. Sebastian admires his long, slim fingers as they drum softly against the countertop, waiting. The first time Jonathan had played the piano for him, embarrassed and brimming with reluctance, Sebastian had been gobsmacked; five years of bored childhood lessons certainly hadn’t given him that kind of talent. As if summoned by the thought, Jonathan appears next to the bed holding out Sebastian’s mug, billowing a curtain of steam. “Sugary and diabetic. Just the way I like it.”  
  
Sebastian mocks a shudder, shaking his head. He accepts the proffered mug and presses a kiss to Jonathan’s nose, which makes his cheeks flush pink. “Thank you, my little sugar fiend.” He takes a sip, trying not to imagine the cloying sweetness. “Now, murder or dresses? Tell me what your dread heart desires.”  
  
“How about murder _and_ dresses?” He’s in a playful mood, pink lips pulled upwards. He lies back down, deftly, without spilling a drop of tea, and presses himself into Sebastian’s shoulder. “Or how about: no Netflix, and we pick up where we left off.”  
  
“Mmm.” Sebastian takes a sip of his tea, brushing his fingers fondly over one of Jonathan’s prominent cheekbones. The lamplight makes his eyelashes shine, but it doesn’t match the mischievous sparkle in his eyes. “Pick up where we left off....where, exactly?”  
  
Jonathan’s fingers curl around the top of Sebastian’s hand, pulling it to the crook of his waist. He’s warm to the touch, like a lit cigarette, and there’s something about him that calls to mind the familiar pull of nicotine. His skin is softer than the paper of a cigarette, though, and he’s supple and solid under Sebastian’s touch—he won’t crumble away into ash. Sebastian moors the tea on the bedside table, handing off Jonathan’s proffered mug, and rubs one of Jonathan’s thin shoulders. He’s all skin and bones, deceptively strong. Sebastian would take any excuse to watch his whipcord muscles work under his skin.  
  
They kiss, slow and languid, as if tasting honey from each others’ mouths. Jonathan’s chapped lips scrape at his own, just a little hint of teeth, and Sebastian smiles as they kiss. He’s never had anything like this before, always hasty fumbling and aching loneliness in another’s arms. Jonathan resonates with something inside him, a secret vibration of the electrons of their respective matter along the same frequency. They drift apart, like boats coming unmoored from a lake’s dock in calm waters, and the warmth of the lamplight is there to welcome him.  
  
Their gazes touch. Sebastian is, as always, puzzled by Jonathan’s eyes. Sometimes a moody blue, an indecisive green, even flecked with specks of brown or orange. They shift and change, undefinable and indefinite as the vague outlines of his amorphous past. He says he’s a shadowhunter, and Sebastian believes him, but he has never claimed to be Nephilim. An unofficial exile from the Clave, his blood tainted by a warlock some generations back. He says _tainted_ like a dirty word, spitting it out like bile in his mouth. A symbol of everything relating to the Clave’s obsession with blood purity. He drifts between Institutes, an outsider peering in through the vaunted stained-glass windows, sullying the name of the Nephilim. Used only when Downworlder contacts or dirty deeds are necessary. Living plausible deniability.  
  
Sebastian had believed him whole-heartedly, at first. He knew how the Clave operated all too well, how it excluded and pushed aside anything that could not fit within an infinitely narrow set of vaunted angelic walls. He’d barely escaped Idris intact—he could relate. It wasn’t until Jonathan had told him his name that he’d gotten the joke. Jonathan Dupont. John Doe, _nomen nescio_. No one, nothing, the modern Odysseus wandering Europe’s underground in search of home. Was it still a lie if one admitted the lie? Sebastian didn’t know.  
  
What he did know was that Jonathan’s eyes were the same as the shadows that played over his empty bedroom walls during those lonely years under Aunt Elodie’s tutelage. The delicate antique eggshell blue paint Elodie was so proud of bruised by the moody, bleak England sky. He’d spent so many hours locked alone in that room, alone with his books on demonology and his lessons, inventing invisible friends to share in the monotony. Still, as with all things of childhood, even they had left him in the end. Or perhaps they were still there, locked away in the cobwebs and dusty shadows, and he was the one who had left them.  
  
Jonathan leans onto Sebastian’s chest, the tips of his cropped-short hair tickling Sebastian’s the underside of Sebastian’s chin, and it’s impossible to feel alone. Sebastian’s hand is on his back and their heartbeats drum into each others’ skin, throbbing into synchrony. Jonathan’s pulse is so quick, like a bird is trapped in his ribcage, though sometimes it dips into such a sluggish slowness it makes Sebastian worry.  
  
_John Doe_ fits him. He’s a puzzle, a web of hints and inconsistency to untangle, tight-lipped and silent as a living corpse in _rigor mortis_. As the mundane Englishman Aunt Elodie so loved to quote would say, “a riddle wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma.” A story gone untold, promising tragedy. Sometimes Sebastian’s imagination played out fantastic dramas with Jonathan as the star—the bastard of star-crossed lovers, a criminal fleeing exile, someone who had learned Clave secrets he was not meant to know. Yet none of them explain the facts Sebastian observed, the little snatches of clues that not even the most accomplished artist can hide.  
  
Jonathan shifts against him, his body supple and relaxed against Sebastian’s, long legs curled up to his chest. His dark eyes are focused on Sebastian’s _deflect_ rune, his fingers tracing it curiously over his chest. Close to the heart. “That was my first rune,” Sebastian says, picking up a hand to run it idly through Jonathan’s hair.  
  
Jonathan looks up, a childish sort of curiosity in his eyes. “How old were you?”  
  
“Ten.” Sebastian reaches blindly for his mug, gropes around until he finds it. He takes a calming sip, feeling the familiar heat spread through his chest. “It wasn’t a big deal, really.”  
  
The memory is hazy, obscured by dust and shadows, but parts of it he still remembers in vivid relief. It had been Aline’s 7th birthday, and Jia had come to visit. Aline had stood there her back ramrod-straight, chubby-cheeked and silent, as Elodie had reported on her progress. Top marks in weapons training, all forms of strength and agility training, her language and political studies humming along without flaw. Only in demonology had Sebastian managed to outstrip her, and he’d watched with a sinking feeling of misery as Jia had criticized her inability to distinguish different subtypes of the Elyvvari demon based on vertebral structure. Sebastian had thought this unfair—that taxonomy system was outdated and inaccurate, anyway.  
  
Aunt Elodie had reviewed his own studies with a disinterested sort of disappointment—no particular skill with weapons, tempered somewhat with a mastery of book learning. Not wholly an embarrassment to the Penhallow name, but not a boon to it, either. “Has the boy been runed?” Jia had asked, once she and Elodie were nominally out of earshot. Her voice was trimmed and cold when she had said, “Give him the defense rune. Raziel knows he’ll need it running away from demons.”  
  
It was pure irony, of course, that Sebastian had managed to spend the rest of his life thus far doing exactly that—running away. First away from the London Institute to Idris at eighteen, then from Idris to Paris, desperately unhappy at twenty-four, then again in a filthy bleeder den in the Paris catacombs two years into his dissertation. Most of the time he wasn’t even sure what exactly he was running from, other than the lingering feeling of dread that he was doing it wrong, that he’d fucked up _again_ , that he’d have to look Jia in the eyes and see nothing but disappointment. And of course it was a self-fulfilling prophecy. He was his own Cassandra, predicting his own destruction, mouthing the same lines over and over. _“Yes, I’m sorry. It won’t happen again. Yes, of course I’m grateful. No, this isn’t what my parents would have wanted. I’m sorry. I’ll be better this time.  I’m sorry.”_  
  
“Ten?” Jonathan’s voice interrupts his thoughts, slicing through the overgrown underbrush of rumination. He sounds sleepy, like he’s drifting off. He talks more like this. Says more, too. “That’s a good age. I got mine when I was young.”  
  
Sebastian blinks himself out of his stupor of self-pity. There’s something unhappy and vulnerable in Jonathan’s voice, a sort of conflict he can’t parse. As if his body spoke a language Sebastian doesn’t understand. He senses the opportunity to press, so he does, with the most deceptive levity. “Really? How young?”  
  
Jonathan barely raises his head, his voice little more than a hazy murmur. He’s just at the gates of sleep, Sebastian knows, and a little streak of guilt shoots through him at the betrayal of trust, but he has to know. Something, anything. The things he’ll do for his John Doe. “Four,” he mutters. “Or five, I don’t remember. Angelic power. It...it burned, like acid and I...I got sick. In bed for months, it was so cold. My father—” His shoulders jerk, just barely, as if with an insuppressible twitch. His body feels heavy as if his limbs are leaden, and he falls silent.  
  
“I’m sorry,” Sebastian says, automatically, feeling the weight of his own inadequacy. All he has to offer:  another broken line from his script. Difficulty receiving one’s first rune was a more common occurrence than the Clave wanted to admit, though it was often due to families runing their children far too early than any true rejection of the angel’s runes. Still, it was often whispered that difficulty runing was due to blood taint in the family line. Sebastian had always personally regarded these as xenophobic rumors, nothing more, but now his imagination ran free, buoyed by possibility. Could the story about warlock blood be true? Or was this another lie, another false clue? He’d watched almost all the true crime shows on mundane television during his worst years, and he knew well how easy it was to follow a promising lead like a ring or a reported sighting only for it to be a false hope. His living mystery will likely be no different.  
  
Jonathan is asleep, his head heavy on Sebastian’s chest. His breath comes in and out in a slow tide, his heartbeat slowed to almost nothing, lulling Sebastian down with him. The lamp light is still on when his eyes drift shut, mind still swirling with intrigue.  
  
  
  
  
  
The bed is empty when Sebastian wakes up. The first thing he notices is the cold—usually by the morning Jonathan is a veritable furnace, worming his way into Sebastian’s arms and heating up his core. Instead of Jonathan he smells laundry detergent—Jonathan is far more strict about washing the sheets than Sebastian is, along with his obsession with folding hospital corners into the sheets. Sebastian hasn’t seen such vigor since the brief time he dated a mundane nurse.  
  
He’s gone.  
  
The realization hits him in a dizzying wave. With effort, Sebastian tamps down on his misgivings. Jonathan could still be in the building, or gone to the gym,  or the grocery store. He probably texted when he left, or left a note. Sebastian knows he’s being ridiculous, and he hates it, but the image of the closet empty of Jonathan’s few pairs of jeans and shirts looms, impossible and too terrible. Sebastian struggles out of bed, jamming his feet into his slippers, stumbling to the closet and wrenching the door open. Jonathan’s clothes are still there, folded in perfect rectangles on the shelves. He’d watched Marie Kondo’s Netflix show with rapt attention and had turned on Sebastian’s apartment in a whirlwind of furious organizing until he’d interrupted Sebastian’s semi-desperate dissertation writing with one too many questions. Sebastian had yelled that if he asked if his rubber duck sparked joy one more time he’d shove it up Jonathan’s ass. Jonathan had looked comically shocked at the outburst and went to finish binge-watching _The Punisher_.  
  
It wasn’t Sebastian’s proudest moment.  
  
A thought occurs to him—Jonathan’s gym bag. He could have packed it and left his clothes. A wave of panic hits him—he has to find it. He has to be sure. In a flash Sebastian is on his knees, still in nothing but his boxers, craning his neck to look under the bed. It isn’t there. What if—Jonathan couldn’t have left. He wouldn’t have. What would Sebastian even do if he was gone? No, no, he has to stop, calm down, this isn’t helping, he’s being crazy—  
  
As suddenly a cloud appearing on a blue-sky sunny day, a nagging sense of desire tugs at the back of Sebastian’s mind. Part of him rallies against it, part of him despairs. Suddenly he’s a student in Paris again, so desperately unhappy he wanted to do something stupid, anything stupid. Stumbling out in no coat at 2 AM, no ID, no phone, no nothing. Already dizzy with an unnamed want and need by the time he got to the bleeder den. The alien and exhilarating feeling of fangs sinking into his neck, a man’s lips sucking at his buzzing skin. He’d barely eaten that day and he passed out and woke up in the Paris Infirmary with a bright light searing his eyes and Jia’s disapproving mask looming overhead. The apology came out on reflex, like acid bile. He was back within a week.  
  
He still remembered his last time in Paris. He’d woken up to the incredible heat of a human body, still hazy and a little sore. His panic when he realized the body wasn’t a woman. Shame, thick and suffocating, had risen in his throat and chest, so much he’d nearly choked on it. He’d been like this, except so much worse, dashing about the tiny apartment cell in search of something—anything, any way out, anything that would make the dizzying throb of reality go away. _Withdrawal_. Hardly a descriptive word. Sebastian hadn’t felt _withdrawn_ , he felt as if he might burst in a thousand ways at once.  
  
The stranger had woken up from the noise. Sebastian didn’t remember much but his voice, the rocks against which his waves of terror broke. _Okay_ , he’d said, over and over and over. _I’m here. Can you breathe?_ A hundred platitudes he’d heard before, from a hundred different mouths. All of them wanted something—none of them stayed. He’d been in the throes of it: shaking, miserable, needing something that wasn’t there—why was it never there? And the voice had said, _stay here, I’ll be right back_ , and as the door clicked shut Sebastian had known he wouldn’t return. He would have taken a whole bottle of asprin if there had been any left, if only to make the pounding in his head stop. And then, as he was curled on the cold bathroom tiles about to vomit again the voice was there, an image of a familiar stranger. _Take this, it’ll help_ , he’d said, and knelt down put a droplet in Sebastian’s hand, guiding it to his mouth.  
  
To this day, Sebastian wasn’t sure if it was the medicine—a root extract from an arcane French island—or the simple fact Jonathan had come back and was _there_ , but after an hour or two the storm passed and the skies cleared. After he drank the cup of water the stranger had given him he’d asked, through a hoarse throat, “Who are you?”  
  
The stranger hesitated, as if unsure. “Jonathan,” he’d said at last, holding out a hand a beat too late. His smile had twitched, like a muscle unused to being stretched. Sebastian had taken the extended hand, and had felt a certainty of the kind that hooked into a fundamental part of him. Jonathan had the steadiest hands of anyone Sebastian knew, including a few medics. _You could be a surgeon_ , he’d tease, kissing Jonathan’s scarred knuckles, and Jonathan would flush to match his close-cropped hair, pink lips pulling up into a smile. _Why would I, when I have you to give me your Netflix password?_  
  
Sebastian sucks in a deep breath, forcing the dizzying wall of panic back. “He’ll be back,” he says, aloud, to himself. He starts towards the kitchen, stalwart, determined to go through the motions of sanity if nothing else. Put on clothes. Bowl, cereal, milk, tea. Get a spoon, stir the tea, attempt to eat the cereal. Drink the milk. “He wouldn’t leave. You’re being ridiculous. He’ll be back soon.”  
  
He’s halfway through his Cheerios and a steady mantra of _shut up shut up shut up shut up_ to the nagging terrors when the door opens, announcing Jonathan’s return with a bustle of reuseable bags. Sebastian jumps up from the kitchen table, too quickly, and nearly sends his breakfast toppling off the table with his hip. He takes two of the bags before Jonathan can drop them and sets them down on the floor.  
  
“I wanted to make you eggs,” Jonathan said, a bit breathless, his nose and cheeks pink-bitten by the cold. He looks hale and hearty and alive, and Sebastian pushes down on the urge to grab him and hug him tight, breathe in the smell of him and a light layer of morning exercise sweat. “But we were out of eggs so I went to the store, but I was hungry so I kind of...went overboard.” He hauls the groceries to the kitchen island and sheepishly draws out a box of Lucky Charms. Pure sugar. “I can bring them back, if you don’t like them.”  
  
At that moment, Sebastian wouldn’t have cared if Jonathan had brought back a bucket of live worms for breakfast. The world’s keel had stabilized, the storm itself a forgotten memory. He presses a kiss to the back of Jonathan’s neck, over his _equilibrium_ rune, feeling his _warmth_ and _alive_ through his skin. He smells of Sebastian’s shampoo, sweet and spicy. “Buy as much of your horrible cereal as you like.”  
  
  
  
  
In the afternoon they went to the park. Jonathan loved the park, and Sebastian knew it was important that the both of them got out of the apartment every once and a while—even if he doesn’t want to. But Jonathan’s awed expression as he watches a pair of monarch butterflies flit over Central park’s fountain proves to be motivation in itself. As Jonathan explores every nook and cranny, running his hands over park benches and marveling at sculptures, he gives an occasional rub at his cheek, where Sebastian had slathered him in sunscreen—to his great distress. “You don’t want to get burned, do you?” Sebastian had asked, sternly, and Jonathan’s lips had twisted into a peculiar smile.  
  
“Of course not,” he’d replied, a strange little light to his eyes, and had submitted to the indignity.  
  
Of course it starts to rain, quite against the forecast, which irks Sebastian greatly. He hates rain after so many dreary years in London, and he hates unexpected rain more than anything. Jonathan, however, doesn’t seem to share Sebastian’s misgivings. He’s smiling, trying to catch raindrops on his tongue, utterly resistant to Sebastian’s attempts to get him under an umbrella (no Londoner, past or present, would be caught outside without one). It occurs to Sebastian that he smiles so little, and when he does it seems as if its being drawn out of him with fishhooks. But now, drenched in the freezing rain that made Sebastian shiver with nothing but a thin shirt to protect him, he seems almost radiant against the grey concrete.  
  
“Look, there’s nyads,” he whispers, then takes Sebastian’s hand and pulls him towards the pond past the fountain. His fingers are ice-cold and Sebastian clutches onto them, worried. The nyads he had spotted are small little frog-like creatures, with big black eyes and wide, friendly smiles that hide needle teeth. Jonathan offers one a coin he’d purloined from the wishing fountain and it chirps in delight—internally, Sebastian wonders what a frog demon is going to do with twenty-five cents. Bring it to the concession stand? He doubts they’re much for hot dogs.  
  
Jonathan tugs at Sebastian’s hand. “Say hello,” he whispers, and Sebastian unwillingly draws closer to the pond’s edge. The nyads look at Sebastian with all the misgivings he feels, a few shuffling away or diving under the water’s surface. There’s something in their iridescent skin that remind him uncomfortably of cheap American lunchmeat.  
  
“They _are_ demons, you know,” Sebastian reminds him, as lowly as he can. Not particularly dangerous, generally, unless provoked or prodded on by some mischievous nixie. Though one had mauled a tourist once in Vienna. Sebastian had nearly been called upon to investigate, and is very glad he hadn’t—the whole process had turned out to be a bureaucratic nightmare.  
  
“Oh,” says Jonathan, suddenly rather put out. He turns away from the pond, looking absurdly hurt. Sebastian moves  in closer to cover him with the umbrella, and notices with worry that he’s shivering, his lips a purpled blue. His short hair is soaked, clinging to his face in wet rivulets.  
  
“Lets get you inside,” Sebastian says, shucking off his coat and wrapping it around Jonathan’s thin shoulders. Jonathan huddles into it, grateful, and Sebastian loops an arm around him, guiding him back towards the nearest café they’d passed. A cup of tea and maybe a pastry was in order.  
  
The café is dreadfully crowded and noisy by the time they get there, but fortunately cleared up as most people hailed a cab or an Uber home. Jonathan, for his part, attacks his hot chocolate and chocolatine like a little wolverine, still shivering under Sebastian’s jacket. “I’m not used to the cold,” he says, sheepishly, and Sebastian smiles. He still has a bit of hot chocolate around his mouth. Sebastian picks up the napkin and wipes at it. Jonathan makes a face but holds still until he can finish, like a squirmish toddler. “Thank you.”  
  
“How would you feel about going to a museum?” To Jonathan’s confused expression, Sebastian adds, “You know, for mundanes. Some of them are quite gorgeous.”  
  
“I’d rather go home,” Jonathan replies, picking at the frosting on the uneaten second half of Sebastian’s apricot pastry. “Cuddle in bed. Maybe take a bath.”  
  
Sebastian groans. “Please, not home. As soon as we’re home I have to think about working on my dissertation, which I am in fact _not_ working on at the present moment. Frankly, I’d rather you chopped off my feet and leave me to die in a dumpster, at least I have an excuse to not be writing.”  
  
Jonathan’s expression turns impish, a sudden intensity in his eyes. Sebastian has learned by experience to associate that expression with good things. His hand is in Sebastian’s and before he knew it they’re at the door, stepping out into the rain under the umbrella. Pushing up onto his toes, Jonathan whispers in Sebastian’s ear, “I might have a few ideas about how to assuage your conscience.”  
  
  
  
  
  
“I have to admit,” Sebastian says through ragged gasps, “that tying me to the headboard was not quite the solution I envisioned.”  
  
Jonathan gives him a look that was both amused and self-satisfied as he swallowed, crawling his way up the mattress to lay his head on Sebastian’s chest. His arm curled around Sebastian’s waist, possessive, the press of skin to skin delicious and warm, like the cup of tea after the rain. “It was effective, though,” he says, very reasonably, his voice resonating in Sebastian’s ribs. “You could ask to be released, but who knows if I would say yes?”  
  
“Such a cruel master you are,” Sebastian agrees, wryly. His impulse is to play with Jonathan’s hair—now dried up into fluff from the rain—but the ropes Jonathan had used to secure him to the bed deny him that particular luxury. “Tormenting me day and night with orgasms. Truly, I wish for a knight in shining armour to rescue me from captivity.”  
  
“I would fight them all off,” Jonathan mutters, not sounding particularly threatening when his voice was so sleepy. Usually, if he had managed to convince Sebastian of the importance of introducing rope into the bedroom, he was the one tied up. Sebastian hates to admit he’s now starting to see the appeal. “I’d kill them one by one.” Jonathan snuggles closer to Sebastian’s side, tightening his arm around Sebastian’s torso and hooking a bent leg over Sebastian’s thighs. His voice is serene when he says, “You’re mine. All mine.”  
  
Sebastian watches him fondly, taking in the gentle tide of Jonathan’s shoulders as he breathes. “I’ll call off the rescue effort, then. Clearly, I ought to accept that I am under your terrible thrall. Or is that Stockholm Syndrome setting in?”  
  
Jonathan _mmm hmm’s_ into Sebastian’s skin and his hair tickles, just a bit. His eyes are closed, and for a moment Sebastian wonders if the poor thing has nodded off. He deserves to catch a cold for his little stunt that afternoon, anyway. Though, it would be hard to make chicken noodle soup to balm Jonathan’s suffering with his hands tied. As if sensing Sebastian’s distress, Jonathan cracks open an eye, craning his neck to look up at Sebastian. “Do you want eggs? I’m craving eggs.”  
  
Sebastian chuckles, stretching by pushing up the small of his back. If he’s in this position too much longer, he’s going to get quite sore. He has no idea how Jonathan does it, although he does seem unfairly limber. “More eggs, already?” He pretends to sigh. “Only if you untie me. As much as I appreciate your efforts to aid and abet my procrastination, I truly _do_ have work to do.” To Jonathan’s pout, he replies, “Also, I believe my hands are falling asleep.”  
  
Jonathan sighs, sitting up with surprising alacrity. Dutifully, he picks apart the knots and pulls the rope free, unwinding it from Sebastian’s wrists. Sebastian draws him in and presses a soft kiss to his lips, then his forehead. There’s a lingering metallic note in his mouth that makes Sebastian smile. “Thank you, sweetheart. I appreciate the diversion.”  
  
Jonathan pulls away, picking at the cuff of his sweater. He doesn’t quite make eye contact when he says, “I’ll make dinner. You get to the keyboard.”  
  
Half an hour later, Sebastian has written approximately four words and spends the rest of the time staring off out the window at the rain. No matter how hard he tries to focus his mind to hone his discussion of Azazel’s vertebral structure in his human form, his thoughts race around like a toy train around the Christmas tree, back to Jonathan and the water nyads. How they’d hopped in close to be near him like the chorus of birds around Sleeping Beauty. Usually nyads were curious but kept their distance, unless to snap snacks away from children. Perhaps they were just accustomed to humans due to the traffic—surely they weren’t the first people with the Sight to spot them. And yet they’d come so close...  
  
“I, um, I hope you like it.” Jonathan’s voice knifes through his thoughts, making Sebastian startle, half in surprise and half in guilt. He had appeared at Sebastian’s elbow, holding a plate of eggs with sliced fried potatoes on the side and cradling a bowl of salad in the crook of his elbow. He offers Sebastian a tentative smile, setting the plate down on Sebastian’s desk. “You, uh, mentioned it’s your comfort food, so I thought I’d try making it.”  
  
Something very warm and hot condenses in Sebastian’s chest, threatening to choke him off. Aline would make eggs and tomato for him when he was unable to get out of bed, bogged down by saccharine sadness. _Baby food_ , she’d say, bursting through into the robin’s eggshell walls and sit down by his bed. _That’s_ _what mom calls it, anyway. It’s fitting, because you use those chopsticks like a five year old._ He remembers the hours he’d spend trying to chase down the last few noodles with his chopsticks. _I can get you a fork, you know,_ Aline would laugh, but she never did, never marked him out as anything but her own. She sat by him until he’d finished, then would make him drink the broth. _It’s good for you_ , she’d chide, then roll her eyes. _At least, that’s what grandma always said. Angel knows if it’s really true_. More than the broth and food, her being there would fill him with warmth, and sometimes he would have the strength to get out of bed. Do things. Anything other than sleep and wish he wouldn’t wake up.  
  
“Thank you, sweetheart,” Sebastian says, and makes himself smile. “You really do pamper me.”  
  
“It was cold outside, so I wanted you to have something warm.” Jonathan isn’t meeting Sebastian’s eyes, picking at his sleeves, looking at everything but Sebastian—his laptop keyboard, the corner of the desk, Sebastian’s bed. Sebastian knows this routine, and he hates it. This is Aunt Elodie’s routine: realize he’d had some kind of episode, come in with tea and hugs and smiles and ask when he’d be _normal_ again. Everyone was so _concerned_ , couldn’t he just be more considerate? “You were upset this morning, so—I can get a blanket, or make tea—“  
  
“I’m not a fragile teacup, Jonathan,” Sebastian snaps. Its immature and childish, and he regrets it the moment the words are out of his mouth, but oh it feels _good_ , giving him that rush that only self-indulgent self-injury can. “You don’t have to baby me. If you sneeze I promise I won’t immediately relapse or die of fright.”  
  
All expression slides off Jonathan’s face, leaving his face blank as a hardboiled egg. Sebastian watches, unnerved, as his head tips down towards the carpet, his arms hanging lifeless at his side, like an automaton losing steam. If Sebastian didn’t know as much as he does about possession vectors, he would have sworn Jonathan had become possessed, or another person entirely. His voice is flat and featureless when he says, “I’m sorry.”  
  
“No, I—“ Sebastian doesn’t know what to say, unsure of Jonathan’s reaction. He hadn’t expected an apology—he had expected annoyance, frustration, anger. The guilt has kicked in, sure as a chair toppling, with none of the satisfaction of making Jonathan lash out. “I’m the one who should be sorry. I shouldn’t have said it, I just—it was wrong of me.” He sucks in a deep breath and pushes it out again. He hates this. He hates _being_ this. “You were concerned and trying to do something nice for me, and I threw it in your face. I’m sorry.”  
  
“It’s all right. I shouldn’t bother you while you’re working.” Jonathan gives him a smile. It looks wan against the rest of his face, like a poorly matched cosmetic.  Before Sebastian can protest he’s backed out the door and shut it behind him, leaving Sebastian alone to reflect on his iniquity.  
  
  
  
  
Sebastian finds the note on Jonathan’s pillow as soon as he realizes the other side of the bed is empty. _Out on Clave business. See you soon._ It’s written on a small square of cardstock in Jonathan’s cramped hand. He’d clearly tried to make the bed before leaving, his side of the covers smoothed down and tucked in so as to be presentable, patted down around where Sebastian slept, and Sebastian swallows back a rush of feeling. He gets up and makes for the shower, turning on the hot water as he rummages around in the cupboard for his favorite bodywash, before a thought strikes him like a tuning fork on the edge of a table. Hastily he switches off the water and throws on a jumper over his pyjamas, then crams himself into his desk chair and flips open his tablet. He selects Aline’s name in the secure contact channels and figets impatiently as the line rings out. Just before he’s about to give up, assuming its too late in Idris for her to be up, Aline picks up.  
  
“Sebastian,” she says, the corners of her mouth lifting up high. “It’s been ages, you bastard. What’s going on with my favorite cousin, and when was the last time you combed your hair?”  
  
“I just woke up,” Sebastian says, a bit defensive. In the preview pane, he can see that his hair does indeed look like a small animal has been nesting in it. “And I won’t tell Leon or Angela you said I’m your favorite. Well, I might tell Leon.”  
  
Aline laughed, spinning her tablet pen in her clever fingers. “Leon isn’t even my cousin, goofball.”  
  
“Leon thinks he’s everyone’s cousin, unless he’s trying to sleep with them. And definitely thinks he’s everyone’s favorite.” It was fitting after a fashion, because he was charming and dashing in a way Sebastian could never hope to be. Full of the true French Verlac flair, none of Sebastian’s dour Englishness. _Even your name is spelled wrong, cousin_ , Leon would say, a cigarette hanging from his lips. _And your French. Mon dieu. Horrific._  
  
“Okay, you got me there.” Aline’s smile turns teasing. “Now come on, I know you’re not calling me at 2 AM to talk about Leon. What’s up?”  
  
Sebastian sighs, pushing his hair back out of his forehead and letting it flop back down again. “I...look, I know it’s a weird thing to ask, but could you run a name for me? I just need to be...I need to be sure of something.”  
  
Aline’s expression instantly tightens into worry and her face grows larger and brighter as she leans into the screen. “What’s going on? Are you in danger?”  
  
“No, no, I’m fine, I promise.” Sebastian has to work at keeping the frustration out of his voice. It isn’t unfair for her to grill the addict—he’s a sad enough case someone’s always worried about him. All he does is bring worry to people. “I’m just being paranoid, is all. It’s all for my peace of mind, I promise.”  
  
Aline sighs, the worry not dissolving from her furrowed brow. “Look, Sebastian...you know I can’t go into the Records for that. Neither of us are above the rules, you know, even if mom _is_ inexplicably popular with the Council right now. Besides, she’d have our hide if she ever found out.”  
  
“You mean like how I do all the taxonomic paperwork whenever the coroner has a demon attack on their hands?” Sebastian asks, keeping his tone light and teasing, but he is right. It’s a lot of work, and Aline hates to do it, and he’s sure as hell not supposed to be doing it for her. Her higher-ups know, and are grateful for the outsourcing, but it’s not officially sanctioned by any stretch of the imagination. “Come on. Just one little search, and I promise I won’t ask again.”  
  
Aline gives him a baleful glare, but by the cant of her shoulders he can tell he’s won. “Okay fine. Give me this mystery person’s name and I’ll _consider_ it, but you owe me a bag of that Starbucks roast I like when you visit Idris next. I mean it. French Vanilla, largest size they have.”  
  
Sebastian chuckles, secretly thrilled with the victory. “I’ll bring you two. Anything for my favorite cousin.”  
  
Aline rolls her eyes. “It doesn’t count when my only competition is Leon and his hideous new mustache. Now come on. Cough up. I want to go to bed, I’ve got an early start tomorrow.”  
  
Sebastian keeps himself from glancing around one last time with effort—he can’t tip Aline off, not now. “Jonathan. Jonathan Dupont. He should be around twenty-two to twenty-four, whiter than me—which is saying something by the way—green eyes, red hair.”  
  
“Jonathan.... _Sebastian_. Seriously, you have me looking up John Doe?” By the look in her eyes, the engines of Aline’s suspicion are firing up again. “Are you sure this is all about peace of mind?”  
  
“Oh come off it. The Dupont family isn’t _that_ new that you don’t know about it. Or are you holding something against the Ascended?” Sebastian had looked up everything he could about the Duponts, and found they were a French family of businesspeople who had Ascended sometime in the early 18th century and were now scattered thinly over Europe. Choosing very typical shadowhunter names was not uncommon for freshly-Ascended families, especially if they were not aristocratically born. A paternal line of Jonathans would not be surprising. Most of the old families like the Penhallows and the Verlacs looked down on those freshly sullied with the mundane taint, but Aline and Sebastian’s generation was at the fringes of a movement to ignore such pointless hierarchies.  
  
“You know I’m not.” Aline sounds stung. “It’s just an odd name, is all. What you’d expect to see on an example French credit card application.” She huffs, defensive, determined to prove his accusation wrong. “Fine. I’ll let you know if I find a match. But for now, I’m going to bed.”  
  
“Thank you.” Sebastian says, then adds with a wry smile, “Goodnight. Even if I just woke up.”  
  
“Goodnight, asshole.” Her expression softens at the edges, like a stroke of watercolor. “Take care of yourself, okay?”  
  
“I will. You too, no more staying up until 2 AM. It’s bad for you.” Sebastian mimes the French air kiss to the screen and she laughs, charmed by the inanity.  “Now off to bed with you.”  
  
Aline rolls her eyes as if to point out it was him that was keeping her up, but waves before the video cuts off.  
  
He’s productive after that. Cleans up the bathroom, does the dishes, makes himself lunch. Slices up a hardboiled egg like Jonathan always does on top of his salad, even makes the bed.  He works on his dissertation, hammering out nearly five pages by the time Jonathan gets home. Sebastian gets up to greet him, almost out of habit, like a dog when its master returns.  
  
“I really wouldn’t,” Jonathan says, as Sebastian goes in for a hug. He seems to be out of breath, somehow, and he  turns away towards the bathroom before Sebastian can draw near, throwing a fleeting, apologetic glance over his shoulder. “I stopped at the gym afterwards. Very sweaty.”  
  
Indeed, his jumper has a long _V_ of sweat down the back, dying the grey fibers black and making the garment cling to his skin. Sebastian hangs back, not asking why he would have gone to the gym in his normal clothes, or indeed why he hadn’t showered or changed there. “Should I join you? I haven’t showered this morning, either.”  
  
“Five minutes,” Jonathan promises, and shuts the door behind him. The water starts up a second later, drumming against the floor of the bathtub. His gym bag is parked beside the door. Sebastian stares at it, the familiar worn blue and black trim. He could open it and look inside. Jonathan wouldn’t know. The temptation is a familiar itch.  
  
He waits five minutes instead, watching the time tick by on his phone screen. He waits an extra minute, just to be sure. The bathroom air is thick and humid with steam when he opens the door, the mirror fogged over so that he can hardly make out his own face. Sebastian strips off his pyjamas, trampling them underfoot as he rummages around in the cupboard to fish out his bodywash. Jonathan’s clothes are wet and hanging on the side of the tub, dark against the porcelain finish.  
  
Jonathan is arched up in the shower’s spray when Sebastian parts the shower curtain to join him, running shampoo through his hair with his fingers. Every line and muscle of his body is on display, lithe and lean and powerful. Sunlight glistens on his wet skin from the window above the shower, and Sebastian is reminded bizarrely of the nyads in the pond and their unearthly, shimmering skin. Jonathan’s eyes flutter open and his lips curl upwards, like a cat—he likes when Sebastian admires him—and he tilts his chin up, putting himself on display.  
  
Sebastian steps into the tub and Jonathan moves for him, leaning into him so that Jonathan’s shoulders bump against Sebastian’s chest. The air is thick with steam and the water is hot, hotter than Sebastian likes, but it’s bearable. Jonathan’s skin is flushed a brilliant pink, all the little venules under his skin becoming visible. His eyes gleam like stones, and for a second he seems unearthly, inhuman. Sebastian kisses his forehead, gentle, and Jonathan makes a soft sound as Sebastian’s arms curl around his waist. Sebastian squeezes out some of the bodywash, setting the bottle down on the soap holder, then rubs it onto the taut plane of Jonathan’s stomach. The soap makes him soft as silk, Sebastian’s hands gliding easily over Jonathan’s wet body and trailing white bubbles. Sebastian rubs at his sharp, jutting hipbones and teases the close-trimmed hair around his cock, making Jonathan whine.  
  
Sebastian’s hands roam to Jonathan’s ass, slicking the pale skin. His flesh is soft, softer than any other part of him, all lined with iron muscle, and Sebastian takes another handful of soap and works his way up the hard slope of Jonathan’s back, mapping the contour of each hard rib and vertebrae. Jonathan’s muscles shift and tense at his touch like stiff clay coming alive under Sebastian’s hands, arms and shoulders curling inward to give Sebastian better access.  
  
There’s a dark, ugly bruise stretching over Jonathan’s side. It’s purple and pink like an unsightly London sunset. Sebastian probes it, gently, and Jonathan hisses.  
  
“Let me get my stele,” Sebastian says, but Jonathan shakes his head.  
  
“I’m fine,” he replies, not looking back. His equilibrium rune is stark against the back of his neck, nearly brushing against the wet fine hairs at the base of his skull. He takes Sebastian’s hand and slides it up his soapy stomach, bringing it up to the hard slopes of his chest. When he looks up, he’s smiling. Sebastian can’t take his eyes off him, suffocated by the steam and the heat. “Keep going. I was enjoying that.”  
  
  
  
  
_Your Doe checks out. Don’t forget the Starbucks French Vanilla blend or I’ll have mom’s new warlock aid hex you._  
  
Sebastian breathes out what feels like a lifetime’s worth of doubt. It was high time he was right about something. He goes into the kitchen and makes cookies.  
  
  
  
  
Jonathan brings home a whole mess of computer equipment and sets it up in the storage section of the basement. Cables loop around everywhere, zip-tied to the furniture and taped down with Jonathan’s careful hands. The computer is loud, always running fans, and connected to a nest of other boxes. Sebastian, who can hardly configure his tablet Wifi, does not bother to offer his help, but does bring him the occasional snack. At one point Jonathan startles at Sebastian’s approach so hard he smacks his skull against his desk.  
  
“Clave stuff,” Jonathan tells him when he asks, through a mouthful of zip ties. He’s arm-deep in a box that has a whole bay of cables coming out of it. “I’d tell you, but I’d have to kill you.”  
  
Sebastian laughs, charmed. “How thrilling. Well, if you need me, Mr. Bond, I’ll be upstairs perfecting my shaken martini and picking out the scandalously revealing dress I’d like to die in.”  
  
Jonathan doesn’t get the reference. Sebastian, horrified, makes him watch _Goldeneye_ that very evening. Jonathan falls asleep about halfway through, though not before predicting 006’s treachery and eventual death. Sebastian takes the opportunity to eat his share of the popcorn. He has to admit _Casino Royale_ might have made a better starting point—Jonathan loves Mads Mikkelsen, though Sebastian’s not sure he’ll be able to stay awake through an hour of poker.  
  
“Is it over?” Jonathan asks, blearily, once he wakes up. The credits are still rolling on Sebastian’s laptop screen.  
  
Sebastian pretends to be wounded, sitting back down on the couch with his hot chocolate. “Yes it is, and no, I didn’t make any cocoa for you.” He relents, holding up the mug so Jonathan can take a sip. He shakes his head and Sebastian lowers it onto the coffee table. “But how did you know 006 was Janus? Is my little genius already that Bond genre savvy?”  
  
Jonathan doesn’t answer for a moment, staring off into the blackness of the laptop screen. “I guess it was because he suffered,” he says at last, almost absently. “The villain always has to suffer.”  
  
Sebastian doesn’t laugh—it doesn’t sound like it’s a joke, though it feels it should be one. All he manages is, “I’m surprised you fell asleep. Has something turned you off murder? I would think James Bond would be high on the list of _Hannibal_ ’s number one fan.”  
  
Jonathan turns away, worrying his cuticles in his lap. Shadows pool under his cheekbones in the golden lamplight, making his face look hollow. “I’m just tired. I haven’t been sleeping well.”  
  
Sebastian takes his hand and Jonathan lets himself be pulled in, laying his head on Sebastian’s chest, as if out of habit. He’s not moving, not snuggling in close for comfort, just lying there staring out into the indigo skyline. Sebastian looks down to see the shining track on Jonathan’s still cheek, as if he himself isn’t aware he’s crying. “What’s wrong, sweetheart?” he asks, in the voice he’d want to be asked. “Talk to me.”  
  
For a long moment, Jonathan doesn’t say anything. Sebastian strokes the back of his hand with his thumb, giving him silence. “I thought I knew what I wanted,” he says at last. “But I got...confused. Now I don’t know.”  
  
Sebastian breathes in deeply, and raises a hand to rub Jonathan’s back, gentle and slow. The bruise is gone, but the question raised isn’t. “You don’t have to want just one thing,” he says, and he can feel the heat of Jonathan’s breath through his jumper. “Sometimes you have to let yourself change, even if it wasn’t what you wanted to be before. Let that other self go.”  
  
When he was a child, he imagined he’d always be by Aline’s side. He’d follow her into battle, even if he had to do it with his eyes squeezed shut. He couldn’t imagine himself with anyone else, as anything else. Sometimes he even imagined them as _parabatai_ , bonded together forever. He waited and waited, but she never asked. So, a month before her eighteenth birthday, and six months before his, he gathered the courage and asked. She said no. A few weeks after his birthday, he left London for Idris. It had taken him years to realize that Aline had said no because she loved him. That if she hadn’t, she might have lied, put herself last, signed herself up for a lifetime of unhappiness, the blame for which would fall squarely on his shoulders. That she’d loved him enough to be honest, and trusted him enough that he might one day understand.  
  
He hadn’t grown up wanting to be addicted to yin fen, either. Of course—no one did. But realizing that’s what he’d become was the pivot point, looking inside for answers rather than pointing outwards. Letting go of the version of himself that wasn’t addicted to yin fen was hard, one of the hardest things he’d ever done. Letting go of the version of him that was proved even harder.  
  
“Sometimes you’re just in-between,” Sebastian adds, more for his own benefit than anything. “Actually, probably most of the time. It’s okay not to know. Most of the time you won’t know exactly. And if you do, you might be wrong.”  
  
Jonathan looks up for a long moment, eyes glassy with unshed tears. Hesitantly, his arm curls over Sebastian’s waist, and Sebastian holds him in. He rests his cheek on Sebastian’s chest again, tuck himself in close in a way that suggests he’s somehow content. He’s warm nestled against Sebastian’s body, and Sebastian can feel some of that warmth seeping into his core, heating him from the inside. “I’m glad I have you.”  
  
Sebastian presses a kiss to the top of his head, blinking away sudden heat and tears of his own. It’s the early hours of the evening, and the pinpricks of lonely light on the inky horizon have just started to blink out. “I’m happy to have you, too.”

**Author's Note:**

> This is supposed to have a second part but I may just leave it as a oneshot, depending on how well writing the second part goes. Either way, thanks for reading and I hope you enjoyed!


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